The Cunning God of Death
by GargoyleKnight
Summary: A story told from the perspective of Samus Aran's greatest nemesis, Ridley, as he attempts to gain prestige among the Space Pirates. The events of this story take place before the raid on K-2L.
1. Prologue

Meteors slowly whirred past the star vessel. Their hurtling images only vaguely making impressions in the pilot's eyes before being forgotten forever. He sat idly in his seat, drumming fingers on the control panel. The stars that blinked beyond the meteors teased the pilot with the very fact that they were so far out of reach yet still visible. He whistled between his teeth and pretended that time would pass quicker, and instead of being four more days away, that his destination would materialize within the next five minutes.

He was an interspatial trucker and had already been travelling for six months. Four more days seemed inconsequential, but to him every minute had begun to feel like an eternity. The massive tank being towed by his star vessel was filled to the brim with fresh fuel gel, and such a volatile cargo required the pilot to travel at much slower speeds than he was accustomed to.

The hum of the vessel shook him on his seat and he shifted his weight uncomfortably. The seat felt too small, the cockpit felt too angular, his uniform felt too tight, and he wished he could sidle up to one of the passing meteors and stretch for a few minutes or a few hours or a few months. With an infinite supply of beer and cigarettes. Lulled with these thoughts, the pilot closed his eyes and began dozing.

He failed to notice the silent winged starship, black as a wraith and gleaming brightly with missiles, come astride his vessel. Nor did he see its own pilot gazing inquiringly in at him. The two ships whorled softly through space for some time, neck and neck, the vessel a tremendous gray slug, the starship a charcoal scorpion. Both pilots rested in the silence. A breath, gentle and cold was taken in, and was let out, hot and hungry.

As if he somehow felt this breath, or heard it, the pilot of the vessel opened his eyes. Instead of the blackness of space dazzled with smatterings of stars, there before him was the black starship. But, it was not the silver missiles nor the sleek, inky dark carapace of the ship that caught the man's attention. In illuminated clarity, he could see the starship's pilot, and he began to quiver uncontrollably.

A long, crocodilian face was staring at the man across the small span of space between their cockpits. Lurid and molten, the pair of red orange eyes burned in the face as wide as bonfires. Fangs that gleamed as brightly as the missiles traced along the sharp snout, the bones of a venomous smile. The rest of the hulking beast was obscured from view, but the man knew it had to easily be twice his size, if not more.

The man screamed once and reached for his transmitter. But, his reaction time was too little too late. The other pilot was out of his own vessel and into the vacuum of space within the breath of a moment. His great, reptilian form landed on the outside of the vessel's cockpit with a raucous clamor, causing the man within to drop his transmitter. It clattered uselessly beneath his seat. The creature spread its wings and eclipsed the man's entire view of the outside. No more stars, or black space, or meteors. He screamed again.

Behind the creature, it readied its tail, the blade on the end held stolidly and poised, ready for the plunge. It fell, ripping through the thick quartz glass with ease. It skewered the man through the chest, shattering his ribcage and shredding his heart. He was alive for only half a second more. Satisfied, the creature withdrew its tail and watched the man hang limply in his seat for a few moments, the red extending quickly down his chest, pooling gently beneath him, and dripping with softness away from his chair onto the floor. The creature could afford to relish this, being in space held no issues for him, at least not for a long while.

Eventually, the man's lower half was entirely sullied with red and the creature had grown bored. Using its tail, it deftly flicked a switch on the control panel, and the emergency airlock was opened in the cockpit's ceiling. Magazines and food wrappers were sucked out, and the man's body twisted in its seat belts, attempting to leave with the other debris.

Removing his tail, the creature leapt back to his own ship, reached inside, and removed a large, mechanical arachnid. With a push of its powerful legs, it returned once more to the vessel.

Too large to fit in the airlock itself, the creature simply pushed a button on the robot spider, and it came alive in a neon blue flash, the segmented legs jerking rigidly and the multi faceted eyes blinking with radiance. It crawled from the creature's massive claw, and with hooked feet, it clambered into the vessel and made its way to the control panel. Extending oblong and square fangs from rubber mandibles, the machine plugged itself into the vessel's computer.

Green light illuminated the dead man's face, highlighting his gaping mouth and wide eyes. The ship's computer spoke words at the corpse.

"Reroute processed. New destination: Planet Zebes. Arrival time: approximately two weeks."

The creature smiled to himself and looked at the passing meteors. Their images made no impressions in his luminous eyes, in fact, the giant hunks of rock could very well have not been there at all. His mind was far away, and the great prize within his grasp now was sure to win him favor.

Yes indeed, Mother would be proud, and Ridley knew well what her pride could bring to him.


	2. Chapter 1

Chapter One

Upon the planet Urtraghus, rain fell and it was acid. Sizzling on the ground, creating a sort of scalding and erratic atmosphere of noise, static and steam. Crags stood in reddened clusters, scattered many miles apart yet all interconnected by an underground transit system. Atop one such upthrust of rock, Ridley perched, watching the acid rain fall around him.

His armored hide was impervious to the caustic liquid, and he found it calming to sit under it, allowing it to sluice along every one of his scales, to bounce off the elasticity of his wing membrane, to coat him until he was drenched and glistering in the red sunlight. He would think like this for hours, planning new raids, or remembering past ones. He would smile, recalling battles and blood, and he would look at himself. A perfect warrior. An unstoppable force. And his time would be soon.

"Captain Ridley," a voice sounded from below.

Looking down, Ridley saw an armored space pirate trooper standing amidst the boulders, the mark on his chest plate indicated him to be of Mother's personal guards.

"What do you want?" Ridley replied, stretching his wings behind him, causing a cascade of rain to fall about the crag. The armored trooper backed away to avoid being splashed.

"Mother wishes for your presence."

The dragon like creature smiled and sprang down, his great frame moving with graceful agility from rock to rock, droplets of acid rain whirling behind him like a shed veil of crimson dust. Ridley landed softly in front of the armored trooper and stood to his true height.

"What does Mother wish for with my presence?" Ridley asked, staring down the length of his snout at the trooper. Even fully armored and clutching its assault rifle, it looked like nothing more than a chrome lizard with a toy in its pathetic hands.

"She did not inform me, Captain."

"No, she wouldn't," Ridley took his eyes from the trooper and looked upward at the dull illumination of the sun behind the heavy rain clouds. "Who else shall be present?"

The trooper took a step back and let a low, hissing breath out from between its fangs. "I do not know, Captain."

"What is your name?" Ridley's eyes returned to the trooper.

"Venn, Captain."

"Keep that loyalty, Venn, hold on to every secret, never let them go. Only the weak break in fear, and do you know what I do to those who are weak?"

"I know well, Captain."

"Take me to Mother, Venn, and remember this talk."

Venn nodded and turned about, following the trail through the boulders to the transit system's entrance. They moved together in silence, Ridley once more lost in his thoughts. They left the surface behind, the incredibly thick entrance doors scraping shut behind them, and they were now in a world of steel and electric noises and of thick orange light. Fragile bodied maintenance workers scurried about, their thin, snake eyes twitching over Ridley only once before darting back to their work.

Ridley and Venn boarded the monorail. Ridley watched the trooper type the location of Mother's courtyard into the control panel. The great machine rumbled briefly, and with a powerful tug on the passengers, began moving. It was a long ride, one laden with silence that Ridley did not feel or care about.

They arrived and the doors sucked open. A cool breeze touched them and it smelled heavily of incense that was bitter and distracting. Ridley wrinkled his lip, revealing rows of fangs so polished and frigid, icicles that hung in furnace red gums.

Mother's courtyard was a sprawling garden with a domed roof adorned with snow blue lights. Monstrous and incandescent mushrooms bloomed from the walls, looking like flabby dead fingers and black blades of ichorous grass grew between the floor panels. A mist hung over it all, the still breath of a tomb yard for fallen giants. Venn and Ridley entered with ease.

At the far end of the courtyard, Ridley could only vaguely see the tube that held Mother. His breathing became deeper and came out in hot plumes from his wide nostrils. Then, his eyes alighted upon the slouching figure standing to the side of Mother's capsule. At once, a dark shake erupted from his chest, rising up his serpentine throat, and exiting between his lips. Venn slowed his pace and listened to Ridley's growl, trying to lower his own quickening heart rate.

The slouching figure turned to regard the new arrivals, and a grin split his own crocodilian face. Though more diminutive than Ridley, with trembling and useless wings and a milky white, blind eye, he was still an imposing presence, and the resemblance between the two was remarkable.

"Ridley, you have made it, at last," the voice was guttural and lacerated, and came in slow bursts.

"Griger," Ridley said with a quick nod. His attention then immediately fell upon Mother.

The floating being behind the glass also looked very similar to Ridley, but the flesh that had once been made of powerful sinew now sagged on the frail bones like rotted fungi. There were no legs or tail, and one arm had recently fallen from the socket and now floated at the top of the capsule, a blackened and emaciated husk that was slowly turning in the bubbling pool of blue liquid. The face had no eyes nor fangs, and so looked like a broken and forsaken dragon, kept alive by the pod in which it floated and the thousands of tubes that ran into its back.

"I have arrived, Mother, what is it that you wish?" Ridley asked, raising a claw to his breast. Griger chuckled, and Ridley ignored him.

"Yes, Ridley, so you have," a robotic voice resonated not from Mother's mouth, but from the computer at the base of the capsule. "I have summoned you both here for you have both proven yourselves in the field as of late. But, the Galactic Federation is growing more powerful, and they have become quite savvy in our lost two more frigates this week, as well as a mining operation in the I-L206 asteroid fields. If operations are to continue in our favor, we need to curb their advance. Griger, you will take the Frigate Darkhelm to the I-L206 mines and take them back. Show no quarter, take no prisoners, and do not fail. Ridley, you lead a squadron of starships and intercept their fuel deliveries before they reach the mines. We need the fuel gel, so do not allow any of it to explode. And I do not want any distress signal being made nor any survivors. Understood?"

"Understood!" was the reply, so quick and similar, the voices melded together and echoed about the courtyard.

"Then go." Mother said and lapsed into silence.

They went. Venn watched their backs, one proud and powerful, towering like a spire of wings and scales, the other subdued and hunched, a bramble of barbs and bones. Brothers, voracious and merciless, perfect warriors, both certain their time was coming soon.


	3. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

The squadron of starships looked like a swarm of black wasps, moving noiselessly through the ether of space. Dark wings, sullen in their sleek finish. Missiles set below the wings, chrome and bright, their sharpened points like stingers loaded with radioactive napalm. And the pilots, reptilian visages with hot eyes, scathing everything in their path with the anticipation of the hunt. At the head of the metallic cloud of silver and ebony, one starship dwarfed the others, as its pilot was twice the size of those within the other cockpits.

Ridley rode before his squadron, his breath streaming slowly between his fangs, the stars in front of him blinking like the whites in screaming people's eyes. Soon, he would give the order for the transmission jammers to be activated, then, his troopers would scatter behind, forming the vast net, and, when visual of the quarry was confirmed, the starships would converge in a simultaneous collapse upon the fuel cruisers. No mistakes, no mercy, and no survivors. Ridley smiled to himself.

The darkness of space would provide them with enough camouflage, their silent starships would be far too quick for any sort of resistance, victory was assured. Yet, this somehow disappointed Ridley.

His thoughts turned to Griger, in the frigate Darkhelm. Ridley knew his brother would soon be landing in the asteroid mines of I-L206, where there would undoubtedly be Galactic Federation marines stationed as guards. It would be no simple task overthrowing them, even with the formidable force of the Darkhelm and the space pirate infantry aboard. The idea of such a heated struggle made Ridley envious of his brother. There was nothing more gratifying than the enthrallment of battle. It was what Ridley was born for. His smile faded from his face, and quietly, he gave the order to commence the operation.

The jammers were activated, the starships scattered, and their engines slowed until they were hovering idly. In the slowness of the moment, the ships hung, so many flakes of soot floating within the ocean of darkness, stars whispering behind wing, under missile, above cockpit.

Everything swam in the silence of the vacuum. Everything waited. The fuel cruisers would arrive soon, rumbling and groaning, tugging the huge tanks of gel with mundane persistence. They would continue, unaware of their peril, until they reached the point of no return. Until they stepped into the claws and stingers and black wings. This moment would be a long time coming though, and the tension amongst the squadron was held behind twisting, forked tongues and multi lidded, split pupiled eyes.

Ridley sat in the confines of his starship and brooded. It was not the silence that bothered him, it was the waiting, while he knew at that moment, his brother was in the midst of a true raid. He gazed at his long claws, they way they caught the warm scarlet light of his cockpit. They were bathed in soft radiance, their razor edges cast only in thin shadows. He blinked slowly and breathed.

"Captain Ridley," a voice intoned through his communication system. "We have a confirmed visual of the target. It would seem that they have a Federation escort, which is unexpected. What is our course of action?"

Ridley's smile returned and thoughts of his brother dissipated. He looked in the direction of the fuel caravan, his powerful eyes easily taking the sight in. Gray metal and bright threads of rocket flame, the fuel cruisers were unmistakable and huge. Less noticeable, the Federation starships whirred, blue ice on gray hawk wings, equipped with blasters that penetrated armor with beams of pressurized plasma. Ridley felt the furnace in his stomach scream and he laughed.

"Forget the net maneuver, we will travel enmasse below them. When they reach the target point, we will spearhead straight for the fuel cruisers, surround them and don't budge." Ridley let his command hang for a moment, then, without waiting for a reply, he dove.

The squadron didn't hesitate to follow their captain, and the swarm moved with swift discipline. The silence hissed on, and the Federation fuel caravan inched forward, gray and glittering.

The noses of the pirates' black starships rose upward, the missiles were readied, and the moment was near. Ridley slavered and growled. The fuel cruisers came into view, slow and sauntering. Their escort appeared at their sides, distant enough for maneuverability, yet, seemingly, close enough for quick intervention if something were to go array. Ridley wondered just how quickly these humans could react. He hoped they wouldn't be completely incompetent, but his hopes weren't very high.

After an unbearable amount of time, the caravan was completely within the target point. Ridley surged a plume of sparks from his nostrils, they flurried about the cockpit like toxic butterflies that hissed and spat with hungry stomachs.

"When we arrive, I want two troopers to board each fuel cruiser. Kill the pilot and apply the hacking spider. The rest of you, I want that Federation escort annihilated. Every last one. If you die, die with one of those flesh sacs in your sights. Now, ready yourselves." He licked his fangs, and then, he roared and charged. The squadron of starships screamed behind him, coal insects with burning abdomens of chemical conflagration.

Fluidly, they clustered around the fuel cruisers, the startled pilots within shouting and gasping and cursing. The Federation escort halted, one beam careened far off target, illuminating the pirate squadron briefly in blue, before it faded into the nothingness of empty space. The rest of the human ships hummed uselessly in place, not daring to fire at their enemy.

Ridley knew they wouldn't risk igniting the fuel gel. The resulting explosion could easily consume them all. The dragon sneered at his adversaries.

"Cowards," he whispered. "Board those cruisers!" He shouted into the communicator. "And the rest of you, the hunt is on!"

Silver missiles lit up the darkness, sparkling and shrieking, molten radioactivity beating in their caustic hearts. Bright blue beams sparked, attempting to intercept the hounding missiles, and the Federation pilots took on frightful evasive action. Several exploded, their pilots too sloppy or surprised to escape the initial salvo.

Then, the space pirates were among them, quick, decisive, and merciless. Twisting through arcing bolts of plasma, they streaked, furious wasps cast from a cosmic nest, their exoskeletons shadow and their stingers precise. Federation starships crumbled in volatile blasts of red and orange and yellow, the light of their deaths appearing like diminutive nebuli before fading into smoldering metal and green smoke.

Ridley was voracious, weaving through the Federation ranks without fear, slaughtering them with his reckless strategy. The plasma beams scalded the sides of his ship, very nearly running it through, but at the very last second, he would whirl just outside of its touch. The Federation starships fell to him in droves, yet he was not satisfied.

Among the other ships, pirate and Federation alike, it was no less chaotic. Wings crumbled in the inferno of missiles, quartz glass melted and split before the piercing ray of a plasma beam, and the screams of man and pirate were swallowed by the indifference of the surrounding void.

At the end, the fuel cruisers were relieved of their pilots and sent on their way to planet Urtraghus. The Federation escort was destroyed. Save one.

The ship, once a proud gray and blue, was a blackened husk, slowly turning with soft momentum. A wing had been sundered, and now the starship twitched woundedly, the pilot inside was frantically waving something white within the half melted shell of the cockpit. The space pirates surrounded him like scavengers about a crippled animal.

"Don't fire," Ridley commanded, his smoking starship arriving within the circle.

He gazed at the lone vessel, somersaulting sluggishly, debris peeling from it in glowing shards and burning dust. Leaning back, the great creature surveyed the rest of the battlefield. He had lost only twelve starships. He himself had destroyed twice as many of the Federation ships. A chuckle reverberated from his deep chest and he exhaled a contented breath. The remnants of his wasted enemies looked to Ridley more beautiful than any star that glowed beyond them.

"We're taking this one prisoner. Mother wanted to learn of the Federation's tactics, and it would seem to me that we have a willing source before us," he said at last.

"Did Mother not say were not to take prisoners, Captain?"

"I know exactly what Mother said," Ridley snapped forward and looked at his squadron gathered around him. "And if you're so adamant about contradicting _me_, I implore you, stand before me and ask that question again. If you're not willing to do that, collect my prisoner, and keep your mouth shut. We're setting course for Urtraghus, and if I hear one more insubordinate thing from any of you, I'll make you envious of the dead we're leaving here."

Ridley said no more. He whirled his starship about and followed the fuel cruisers. His mind wasn't on their stolen fuel gel, nor on their crushing victory, instead, his thoughts were lingering on one thing.

The squadron all around him were simple minded drones. They followed unquestioningly. Mindless and small. He knew his brother must be the same way, for Griger definitely wasn't coming back with any prisoners. But, Ridley wasn't satisfied with that. He knew he was meant for so much more.

He glided into space, and his squadron followed, the prisoner towed on long cables. The battlefield was left behind, fading like a noiseless ocean wave receding from a formless shore.


End file.
